So there I was, sitting in a tree. I figured I had the deer all figured out. Along comes this 8 pointer. At least that's what I called him. He's coming straight my way. He get 35 yards away and turns left through the thicket behind a screen of brush. Then he turns head on, then behind some more brush and starts on a line that would put him about 30 yards out. I'm ready. He veers more away... when he finally hits the hole I call it 40 yards. I squat a little to shoot under a limb. I settle my 40 yard pin below center and let squeeze it off. The arrow is heading perfect right on a path that should put it right at the crease. It's looking good. It's looking better.... and then the bottom falls out the last few yards as the arrow looses ground. It looks like it passed just under the brisket about an inch behind the leg. If he had been closer and squatted I'd have centered him...but he didn't make a move until after the arrow got there. He runs away, circles back where he came from and is gone. Positive I missed. I called Mdbowhunter on the radio and gave him the news(we were about 200-250 yards apart. Scared buck coming your way. Never happened.

10 minutes later a really big doe and another doe walke directly under me offering about 20 slam dunk opportunities. Why is that. The buck was suppose to come through the same thicket. I got down at dark and went to retrieve my arrow. It was dark and there were leaves and tall ferns all over the place. COuldn't find it. So I turned on the light and walked the trail the buck had run. OPS... a spot of blood, and another, and another. I'd find just a pencil size spot ever 10 yards. I finally found a little dripping where he had stopped but I knew it was nothing vital. Decided if it was he wouldn't die right away so I'd give him till morning. Found the arrow in the AM. Clean as a whistle except for a smearing of tallow on one side of the arrow. I walked off the shot.....45-46 yards. Two inches higher... 5 yards closer and I kill the bugger. It was the prettiest arrow flight you ever saw for the first 40.[&:][&:] I had marked the last tiny speck I found the night before. Picked it up in the AM but never found another drop. Positive on the shot. I would have swore it missed altogether. No sound or smack. No hunching or anything. The bugger just had his brisket line shaved by one blade of my Thunderhead. Flight tested the arrow. Perfect. New blades ready to go. SO anyway... I flat azzzzzzzzzzzz missed. That's better than buggering him up. But I'd rather have been 3 or 4 inches higher.

We hunted Thursday night - Sat AM. Not many deer sightings at all. I saw 7 or 8 the night I missed the buck. Rick saw a spike and a couple does... that was it. Len, Rick and I hunted this AM and drew blanks just as we did last night. They still don't have all the corn down. Rick had a hunt kind of messed up the night I missed the buck by a guy wandering in from the adjacent property and giving him some grief. After Rick showed him the property line a couple times and relayed what I was adding over the radio the guy left. We pointed out he was the interloper...not us. So, we had cameras and lots of memory cards and all kinds of people to drag........but nothing to drag except our sorry butts back and forth to the trees. I told RIck he's a failure. All my guest have ALWAYS gotten a deer or two. This morning I decided I was going to whack one of the numerous does I've let walk for the past 3 weeks. Of course I didn't see any. That's the way it's suppose to work according to Murphy's Law.... but I think we'll change that to Murrays Law. He's a failure.[8D][8D][8D][8D] Fun time...no deer and one sorry shooter.

Rick is now a permit carrying scoundrel of the Petting Zoo. Next trip I'm going to teach him the proper way to take a dump in the woods. Can you believe he had the nerve to climb down this AM before the appropriate time and made a hasty dump in our woods. Some people![8D][8D][8D]